Atkins explained. “Is there any wonder, then, that Franklin's song about respect used to include the lyrics, ‘R-E-S-P-E-C: find out what it means to me’?” "Her producer had to argue to convince her that there’s a “T” at the end of “respect,”" Atkins said. Franklin then tried to change the spelling to end the word with a 'K.' Her producer only got her to sing the correct spelling by plying her with crack. “Fortunately, the letter ‘T,’ like ‘C,’” rhymes with ‘me,’ or her song would have been ruined. "By the time the song was recorded and became a hit, she couldn't change it." "To this day, she sometimes sings it incorrectly in concerts --particularly, when she's sober."

Illiterate “poet” Jim Morrison

As another example of “musical illiteracy,” Atkins cites “Touch Me,” a song by The Doors' self-described "poet",Jim Morrison. “Jim was too strung out on drugs and alcohol to remember the difference between the objective and the nominative case of the first-person personal pronoun, if he ever knew the distinction al all.” Atkins said. “In ‘Touch Me,’ he croons,

Musical pop stars think they are better than everyone else, Atkins charged, and “above the laws of grammar. As a result, our kids are growing up grammatically challenged, not knowing their asses from their participles.”

Rap songs represent some of the worst offenders, he added. “They’re so bad even Little Richard refuses to listen to them, and Ozzie Osbourne makes his wife and daughters wear earplugs when listening to rap songs.”

Osbourne agreed that rap song lyrics are not only examples of poor grammar but are also instances of bad taste. “The language in those fucking songs is fucking profane,” he declared. “Nobody in my fucking house listens to that fucking shit. It ought to be fucking outlawed.”